About Dr. Ed Meyer
Dr. Edwin F Meyer
About the Instructor: Dr. Edwin F Meyer is the oldest of six children. Both his parents have PhDs and all five of his siblings have a PhD. The reason for this concentration of PhDs is that Ed and his brothers and sisters were challenged with puzzles and games at an early age.
Ed received his PhD in physics in 1988 from Case Western Reserve University. From 1989 through the summer of 2000 he worked as a research scientist for Imperial Chemical Industries. While at ICI, Ed’s primary job was solving problems at chemical production plants around the world. He also became a recruiter, and traveled to colleges around the country to recruit fresh talent. During his interviews he would challenge the candidates to solve problems and was frequently disappointed. “Too often, the candidates wanted to impress me with their knowledge,” Ed says, “I don’t care what they KNOW, I want to know what they can figure out.” He strongly believes that too often students are given answers to remember rather than problems to solve. “Children need to struggle with challenging problems. It’s great practice for life.” In 2000, Dr Meyer quit his position as a research scientist and became of Professor of Physics at Baldwin Wallace College. He quickly developed an Honors course called Problem Solving. This course is a student favorite and has been featured on Channel Five News in Cleveland. He has taught his problem solving course in New Zealand while on sabbatical and he teaches a focused version of the course in the graduate business program at Baldwin Wallace. Ed had taught numerous summer camps for talented and gifted students from ages 12 through 17.
